Last unit Kibby and Strand faced a quality issue right before the Christmas season and this got the attention of the CEO and senior leadership. The company has done well using its current models for forecasting supply of raw materials and demand for its products, but when marketing starting shortening delivery time to appease customers it created the circumstances that led to quality issues. The shorting of delivery times also impacted the flow of cotton and wool from your suppliers. There were days when the receiving department was getting overwhelmed with suppliers delivering cotton and wool, so much so that their trucks were stacked up waiting to unload and this prevented your own deliver trucks from getting to the loading dock to ship products to customers. Basically, shifting the delivery days up had a domino effect on receiving, production, and shipping. Who would have though one small change in demand would result in all these issues?
Kibby and Strand poses the perfect scenario for a supply chain management analysis. Supply chains are the lifeblood of organizations like Kibby and Strand. The operations manager uses supply chain management to do the following:
Manage procurement of raw materials.
Manage suppliers.
Manage customer demand.
Determine if outsourcing is beneficial or needed.
Identify problem in the supply chain and respond quickly
In the scenario below you will be given the opportunity to apply supply chain management to help Kibby and Strand.
Sample Solution
